…Isamu Noguchi created a bust of Ginger Rogers? She learned on December 7, 1941 that the Japanese sculptor was willing to do the bust. She had previously sent him word “that she would like him to sculpt her.” On December 8 she invited Noguchi to her home. But the sculptor would end up doing the work in an internment camp in Arizona and not finish it until August 1942. In a letter to Rogers, Noguchi wrote of the bust, “May it go down through the ages as a remembrance of a lovely lady of our times.”

The sculpture, of pink Georgian marble, now in Washington’s National Portrait Gallery, stood in Ginger Rogers’ living room until her death. I owe all the facts here to Sara Kaufman’s Washington Post article, reprinted in the Columbus Dispatch 11/4/14. The quote “that she would like him to sculpt her” is Kaufman’s. She notes, in her article, using Rogers’ book Ginger: My Story.

ADDENDUM ON Prisoners

On 4/24/15 Rick’s Flick’s discussed Prisoners: I recently uncovered two comments from Entertainment Weekly that I wanted to be sure my readers saw:

“You’re never sure where morality leaves off and wrathful insanity begins. The movie is a meditation on crime, punishment, love, and violence…”

And this (SPOILER ALERT): “…in the performance of Melissa Leo [the film] conjures something many films try for and few succeed at capturing: the existence of everyday evil.” (Entertainment Weekly 12/13/13)

FRENCH SHORT TAKE

Viva Maria! Louis Malle 1965

Colorful, charming, musical, satirical, amusing, hilarious, AND sexy. Brigitte Bardot and Jeanne Moreau in a Latin American revolution. A must see, if you haven’t.

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Mon, 01 Jun 2015 11:32:28 +0000steve mckenzie'shttps://blog.stevemckenzies.com/2015/06/01/noguchi-playground-at-atlantas-piedmont-park/It’s “art you can touch” and it’s right in our own backyard!

While taking a walk and exploring their new neighborhood, Steve, Jill and their youngest, Mimi, discovered Isamu Noguchi’s architectural playground!

Mimi and Jill enjoying Noguchi Playground

This was a wonderful surprise to learn of, as Noguchi is a big influence on Steve’s art and when visiting the museum dedicated to him in NYC, they discovered he had designed this wonderful playground in Piedmont Park.

A view of Piedmont Park during the McKenzie’s evening walk.

In addition to Noguchi providing great influence over Steve’s art, he and Jill also enjoy living with a Noguchi-designed coffee table…

Noguchi is both an artist and an architect, a set of skills visible in the modern design of this children’s playground.

Now that Steve has been properly surrounded by Noguchi’s designs here in Atlanta, he’s ready to visit his studio in Japan… A bucket list item indeed!

This has not been an easy day. Waking up to a dark, rainy morning does not crater my spirits, though that was the climate that greeted me at 6 a.m. and stayed throughout the day. No. Today was a day that brought me into contact with two students knocked down by serious medical issues. As a teacher, I know that I have stayed above the fray of meddling–I do not get emotionally involved with my students’ personal affairs. From my first day, twenty-seven years ago, I have felt that caution to stay away from the personal stuff–pour as much passion and intellectual material into their minds on a daily basis as possible, but do not try to be a father or big brother or guidance counselor to them. I have been consistent. But for the first time that I recall, I have spent an entire day inside this school building, fighting back tears, bitter tears. These students are too young to bear what has been dropped onto their slender shoulders. And I cannot even begin to know what their parents feel, because I am crushed beyond help as I write this.

Once school let out, I felt the need to shake off this heavy week, and decided to return to the Kimbell Art Museum in Forth Worth. The rains had brought cool winds, and I felt my tensions elide as I sat behind the Kimbell, sketching the Henry Moore “Figure in a Shelter” bronze that quietly anchors the outside corner of the museum.

Henry Moore“FIgure in a Shelter”

After the sketching period soothed my spirits, I turned to one of my Robert Motherwell books, and read his comments about one of his favorite poets, Stéphane Mallarmé:

Sometimes I have an imaginary picture in mind of the poet Mallarmé in his study late at night–changing, blotting, transferring, transforming each word and its relations with such care–and I think that the sustained energy for that travail must have come from the secret knowledge that each word was a link in the chain that he was forging to bind himself to the universe; and so with other poets, composers, and painters.

Just this morning, as I was ironing my shirt for school and listening to a DVD over the life of Frank Lloyd Wright, I thought of Wright’s analogy between the composer and the architect, how each symphony was an edifice of sound. As I sat on that back deck and mused over the synergy between all the creative souls on this earth, my eye drifted over to Isamu Noguchi’s “Constellation” in the sculpture garden below.

It was nearly time to go inside for the 6:00 lecture on the contributions of Noguchi, so I gathered my books and went inside. Unlike many museum lectures, this speaker was stunning. Alison de Lima Greene, curator of contemporary art for the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, delivered her lecture titled “Isamu Noguchi: Between Measured Time and the Vastness of the Universe.” Her scholarly erudition was first rate, and her skillful use of words kept me on the edge of my seat. Halfway through the lecture, the lights suddenly went up, and security instructed us to move directly to the underground shelter, as a tornado warning was in progress. I did not know until then that an underground tunnel connected the Kahn and Piano buildings of the Kimbell Art Museum.

Waiting out the Storm

Once the storm passed, and we were allowed to return, I would have had the perfect excuse to exit the lecture. But the thought never entered my mind. Returning to my seat, I listened to the second half, equally as engaging as the first. I would drive across several counties to listen to this scholar lecture on any topic concerning the arts.

Driving home later, I felt good for the first time today, and am fortunate that this evening’s opportunities were afforded me. Twice this week, the Kimbell has provided a respite for troubled days. I tried twice today to pull some troubled souls out of the waters. In the end, I needed to be pulled out as well, and I’m thankful that spiritual healing was offered. I want to close this chapter with some words from Emerson’s Nature that Frank Lloyd Wright never tired of sharing:

Every spirit builds itself a house; and beyond its house a world; and beyond its world, a heaven. Know then, that the world exists for you. . . . Build, therefore, your own world.

Thanks always for reading.

I paint in order to remember.

I journal when I feel alone.

I blog to remind myself that I am not alone.

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Thu, 09 Apr 2015 01:16:58 +0000Amber N. Wiley, Ph.D.https://monumentalmundanemoments.wordpress.com/2015/04/09/the-golden-triangle/I knew ahead of time that Delhi would be crazy, but I was not prepared for the amount of crazy. Perhaps it is because I chose to stay in one of the most congested portions of an already congested city. Today Paharganj is known for its bazaar, as it was almost 400 years ago. It is described as “chaotic, noisy, and dirty,” on theDelhi Tourism website, and is commonly referred to as the “traveller’s ghetto.” It was exhilarating at the same time that it was exhausting. I had done enough online research to know what to expect, but there is not much one can do in terms of preparation for that type of environment. I had a hotel room with no external windows, which was fine since the decibel level of noise pollution on Arakashan Road was outstanding, even for India. Despite all of that, there was a certain magic to Arakashan Road, as hotel sign advertisements lit up the night sky like Broadway.

Delhi is a highly fragmented, frenetic city, with old and new quarters existing in stark juxtaposition. As a World Monuments Fund brochure proclaims, “Delhi is not one city, but many.” Since Paharganj traditionally lay outside the old city walls it is a transitional, interstitial space. In Paharganj one is a short bajaj ride from Connaught Place (1929-1934), the commercial complex designed to act as a nodal point between Old and New Delhi. It still serves this purpose today.

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Thu, 02 Apr 2015 01:57:51 +0000Yaya the Duckhttps://yayatheduck.wordpress.com/2015/04/01/isamu-noguchi-museum/My favorite museum built by my favorite sculptor. It is located in Queens, a true oasis among the noisy people and concrete creatures of city life.

“A desolate prison camp in the high desert seems an unlikely place for a Japanese garden contest, let alone an outstanding collection of Japanese gardens. World War II would seem an unlikely time for Japanese Americans to assert their Japanese heritage. Yet the Japanese Americans incarcerated at the Manzanar Relocation Center, now Manzanar National Historic Site, left a legacy of beauty, resistance, and resilience in Japanese gardens.

The incarceration of almost 120,000 Japanese-Americans — most American citizens — by the US government during World War II is one of the most shameful stories in American history. The “Relocation” removed persons of Japanese ancestry from their homes, schools, and businesses on the West Coast and placed mostly behind barbed wire. Manzanar opened in March 1942 — one of ten camps — to incarcerate more than 10,000 people.

Although this episode managed to stay out of US history books for decades, it has come to light through the efforts of the Japanese-American community, civil rights advocates, historians and archaeologists.

Three of these sites are now part of the National Park Service, which is charged with educating the public to prevent similar government-sponsored racism…..”

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On the Purpose & Role of Japanese Gardens in American Internment Camps by Seiko Goto, Ph.D.

“Multiple Japanese gardens were built in all ten internment camps. Japanese gardens in Manzanar Relocation Center have been called “Momoyama-style gardens,” and summarized as an “important means for the expression of Japanese American cultural values within the regimented organization of the camp.” The question arises: why would internees facing such hardship due to their nationality decide to build gardens to express their culture? It is thus important to analyze the purpose and role of Japanese gardens in the internment camp to assess their value….

….Internment is generally the confinement of people done by a government to police people and confiscate their assets. Japanese internment in the United States, however, was unique in that these camps confined people with American citizenship based only on their ethnic background. The camp gardens were also for viewing and living, not solely for food production…

…Conditions and facilities in the camps varied. Administrators in Gila River, Granada, Manzanar, and Topaz supported garden construction and large scale gardens were made in these camps. Small ornamental Japanese gardens, however, were made in all. Poston is notable as the famous Japanese American sculptor Isamu Noguchi became the chief landscape planner…”

Read the full version of these articles in the 2014-2015 NAJGA Journal. The Journal is free to members of the North American Japanese Garden Association. To order additional copies or to order as a non-member, click HERE.

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Fri, 06 Mar 2015 05:14:33 +0000antshopyokohamahttps://antshopyokohama.wordpress.com/2015/03/06/heaven-by-isamu-noguchi/Last month, I happen to be in Tokyo so I dropped by to Sogetsu Kaikan ( Sogetsu HQ Building) which is located in Aoyama. I’ve been studing Ikebana, the Sogetsu style for quite a while and I wanted to get a book by Sofu Teshigahara the founder of Sogetsu.

It’s been, maybe like 10yrs? since I went to Sogetsu HQ. I went to see a textile exhibition taken place at the main entrance hall designed by Isamu Noguchi. This hall (space) is call [Heaven]. It’s a rock garden ( huge staircase, mountain??) . BTW, this building itself is by an Architect, Kenzo Tange, and both Noguchi & Tange was Teshigahara’s good friend.

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Tue, 03 Mar 2015 21:28:00 +0000Shadi M.https://shadimirzai.wordpress.com/2015/03/03/brian-at-the-noguchi-museum/
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Tue, 03 Mar 2015 16:25:57 +0000Iris Wanghttps://woven-words.com/2015/03/03/perpetual-art-student/https://arteviction.wordpress.com/2015/02/20/new-york-city-history-x/
Fri, 20 Feb 2015 09:23:56 +0000artevictionhttps://arteviction.wordpress.com/2015/02/20/new-york-city-history-x/New York City, renown as a mecca to artists from every genre, can be described as maintaining a longtime abusive relationship with its culturally noteworthy residents, who simultaneously are apparently nurtured but at the same time submitted to torture with violent evictions and the destruction of their art. In a forthcoming text privately shared with ART EVICTION but reportedly to be imminently released as an article by an unnamed publication (who we will certainly credit as soon as informed), arts journalist J.T. Wilhelm accurately recounts:

“Evictions are nothing new in the biographies of artists; in 1932 while away in Chicago, Isamu Noguchi learned that he had been evicted from his studio at 58 West 57th Street. In 1936, the late Willem De Kooning moved to a loft in 156 West 22nd Street; during this period the artist became engaged to Elaine Fried (Elaine de Kooning) and they moved to a larger space in the same building. They married in 1943; two years later, the artists were evicted.

“Long after MoMA [the Museum Of Modern Art] had acquired his work in the mid-1960’s, Robert Indiana was evicted from his studio and home in a 5-story building on The Bowery in 1978. “After fourteen years my landlord decided to jack up the rent,” he bitterly reminisced to Index Magazine. Somehow, he was able to move the entire contents of his New York City studio by truck (and ferry) to rural Maine. But perhaps the move from NYC is why Indiana did not reportedly achieve – as of yet – similar market success as Roy Lichtenstein or others who stayed near the city despite its many challenges.

“Many artists throughout history have used their homes as art studios including Chagall, Picasso, Giacometti, Duchamp and Georgia O’Keefe… If every New York artist who did art work out of his or her home were able to be evicted, then the next Robert Rauschenberg or Andy Warhol (all New York artists who worked out of their home) may never have [had] the opportunity to evolve and become a success.”